I choose to win

My heart is full today and I am not exactly sure what to say. This has been one of the most testing and trying weeks of my life. I didn't know if I was strong enough to make it through this trail. However I have learned a lot this week. I have learned that people are entirely and absolutely good; we as a species may be entirely selfish and self-consumed, however in the face of tragedy( or at least what feels like it) individuals are able to put themselves aside and help a friend in need. Every man carries with them the light of Christ and it shines through in the face of adversity.  I will never forget the friends I have or the sacrifices they have made for me. I have learned that I am stronger than I ever thought I could be. I have learned just as I have time and time before that my father in heaven loves me, he will carry me every step of the way and will never leave me in darkness.

I cannot say I didn't bring this upon myself I knew exactly how this would have to end, but as a friend once told me “I couldn't not take the chance". It sounds cheesy, but my life has been changed and I wouldn't take back a single moment or a single lesson I learned through this experience.

It has been a hard month. Facebook feels like the pit of despair with one tragic post after another.  I have found several of my friends with their heart and their spirit broken.  I have caught myself wishing I could offer comfort, however there was/ is nothing I can to heal their hurt or improve the situation. I guess that is not my job. Just as I cannot struggle through my own trails alone I cannot fix the trails of others.

“My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment; And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy foes.”

I promise that our father in heaven loves his children. We will never be alone. I understand that life can be hard; losing sucks, losing anything, a loved one, a relationship, a friendship .Our father in heaven will make all of this up. We have the opportunity to choose not to lose. God is going to win. Our savior gave his life and because of his sacrifice we never have to be alone again. God is going to win; we simply have to choose to be on his side. I understand that this decision may not be as easy as it sounds. However I know that our father in heaven loves us, is aware of our struggles, and is aware of our pain. This is why he allowed his precious begotten son to suffer on the cross; for you and me. Our savior went through every possible amount of pain we can conceive and then some. It was not in vain. I will not waste his atonement.

God is going to win!!!! We are going to win, and every ounce of pain will be made up. Today I choose to stand with my father in heaven. I choose an eternal family, I choose to serve a mission for the church of Jesus Christ of latter day saints, and I choose to be happy. 

A Life To Remember

I was going to start off by saying, what a crazy couple of weeks, but I realized that is just about how all of my posts start. I guess I just live one crazy life!

Well for those of you who may have missed the news My best friend since the premortal life is engaged! Her finance Parker is the sweetest, greatest, and most fantastic person. I could not have picked two individuals more perfect for one another. Tadja Potter has changed my life. I can honestly say I would not be the same person had she not blessed my life. When we were both younger I would come home from a weekend at her house, I would want to be cleaner and have more pink decorations just like her. I would want to take better care of my toys and clothes so they could be as nice as hers. However as I grew older and would return from her house I would still want to change to be just like her, but I wanted, I want, to be more spiritual  more involved in this wonderful gospel, more patient, more righteous, more like this amazing spirit god has blessed me with. I do not know what I did to be so lucky as to deserve a best friend like her, but I am grateful everyday that she has been here to influence my life. 

We spent the weekend wedding planning and dress shopping, as I sat on the train I had the startling realization that this is the last time it is ever going to be like this. Our lives are changing forever. while growing up we all made plans of our future lives that included each other. while we will always love each other and we will always be close, everything is going to change. Tadja potter is getting married MARRIED! I am headed off to who knows where to serve the lord for eighteen months and Nicole has her whole life ahead of her, if anyone is going to make a difference in this world it is going to be her. I have never meant another individual who feels so deeply, who loves so much, and who has such a tender heart. Our lives are changing and just as they should, our plans do not revolve around one another anymore. After this summer it is all going to change. It is exciting and scary all at the same time! sometimes when life gets stressful I like to think back to days spent in the sun playing dress up and eating Popsicle with tadja or nights spent at Nicole's house laughing and giggling for what felt like eternity. 

I hate change, it scares and excites me all at once. we spent our childhood planning these days, waiting non to patiently, to find our prince charming and running off into the sunset. Do not get me wrong i love my life, i have been so blessed and i could not be happier, but as I sit here living the exact moments we would dream about I cannot help but miss the memory of it all. 

Life is funny like that. We are never fully satisfied with where we are. I always want what I do not have. Last year at this time I wanted to be an RA more than anything, and now I want more than anything. I forget that although time is not money I can waste it and blow it, just like money, on trivial shallow experiences. I want my life to be something remembered. I want more than anything to make a difference, I want someone to hear my name and smile. 

My goal today is to make a difference, to make a memory. 

Called to serve

General Conference 2012 Saturday morning session changed my life. i had always planned on going on a mission, it had been a part of my life plan since my junior year in high school. however when i came to college so many other worldly honorable opportunities had presented themselves. i finally found a job that i love at a university i had fallen in love with. there was so much that i wanted to do, i wasn't ready to give up on this path yet. just the night before general conference i told my mother i was thinking about postponing a mission to later or never. my mother lovingly did not judge me she told me it was my decision and it was between me and the lord. like most decisions i hadn't even asked my father in heaven what i should do, i took maters into my own hands without any guidance from he who knows me best.
the next morning as i walked into the conference center Jennifer and i were discussing the idea that both of us wanted to serve missions however i was still unsure. let me stop right now and tell you how grateful i am for a father in heaven who knows and loves his children, a father in heaven who takes an interest in a twenty year old girls life. let me bare my testimony that i know my father in heaven loves me and that he is looking out for me. i know without a doubt that he LOVES ME!! That Saturday morning my father in heaven reminded me of where i needed to be and what i needed to be. sitting in the conference center it felt like the prophet looked right at me and in the words "19 year old young women can serve missions" he said to me "Megyn this work and this gospel is the most important thing you will ever do, our heavenly father loves you he needs you, and you for yourself need to serve a mission"
i feel ashamed to admit that i had become like Paul  i had seen the savior i had felt his spirit and i knew the truth of his gospel and i knew without a shadow of a doubt the importance of his mission, his atonement and my role in his gospel. i too unfortunetly left to go fishing. i spent my time worrying about things that were unimportant  best friends i missed talking to, essay that needed to be written, money that i didn't have. in this conference the lord said to me, Megyn isn't it clear that while all of this is important to you so therefor it is important to me, this is not what i need you to be doing this is not were i need your focus. why are you here? why did i send you here? my gospel is the most important thing, the best gift i could give to this world and i have allowed you to be raised in it, i have blessed you with the knowledge that i will never leave you, how could you be so selfish and not share it with those around you?
so here i sit on a Sunday afternoon sharing with you the experience that changed my life. i Megyn Chantelle Rushton have been called to serve a mission. a mission i have been called to since birth, serve his children, share his gospel live my life as his example and dedicate my life to him.  i plan on serving a mission for my savior for a year and a half in some land i do not know with people i never met. i however i am serving a mission right now, a mission i will continue to serve long after my mission. i am a child of good who has been blessed with a knowledge of who i am and who he is. it is my mission to live this truth and share it with his children

sometimes you are a woo girl

I don't know how many of you have ever watched the TV show how I met your mother #bestshowever. Well at one point in the show one of the main characters Robin makes friends with the singles girls at Lilly's work. The girls are loud obnoxious and.........woooie. Lily, who has a great career and is married to the dorkiest cutest man ever, doesn't understand her single friends, Robin explains that she is single, jobless, and clueless as to where her life is going. She can't always have it together, sometimes she needs to woo.

Sometimes I think my forehead has wooed girl stamped across it. I have thought about changing my major at least three times in the last week, something I swore I would never do. The next year of my life is a mystery; stay here and continue being an RA, stay here and run for RHA president, go on a mission, stay here and volunteer with casa and work with children who are abused; my life is one giant mess of possibilities. I was dang certain I had my life planned out, guess who was 100% wrong? This girl. Sometimes it's exciting, sometimes it' stressful. What is the antidote you may ask, wooing. I however woo differently than robin. I don't take my single friends to bars downing shots, checking out single men and shouting woo at every possibility. I live I love I laugh I cry. I love where I am I love all of the possibilities harshly thrown in my face (more possibility’s, what if I live in Fiji for the summer) growing up I believed my life had two possibility's; go to college get married have babies. Or go to college go on a mission get married have babies. Those are still two real possibilities and no matter what I want right now, I have always wanted to be a mother. But what happens in between? If you read between the lines of my story what is there, what does my life imply, what is it to become, what will my legend be? I can tell you what’s between the lines right now; a poor college student who love her life, her friends, her heavenly father and herself.  This has been the best year of my life. Who says that woo girls can't have fun or meaning in their life? Well whoever says it is wrong. My name is Megyn (hi Megyn) Rushton and I am a woo girl.  

this is me

What a crazy couple of weeks it has been. this has probably been the most stressful challenging month of my life, and i have loved every second of it. my job is the best. i never could have ever imagined how hard it would be, or how strong I am. My weaknesses, bad habits, and insecurities have all been brought to the surface in just this past week. each have had to been dealt with and overcome. i love this job that pushes me to be what i have always wanted to be and forced me to take a good hard look at myself. i never could have imagined what this job would do for me, and in the first week already!! That’s not to say it hasn't been hard, or that i haven't had my fair share of breakdowns in the past week, but it has made me stronger for sure. i love all of my residents and my coworkers, both have pushed non to gently for me to take responsibility for my actions. I LOVE THIS JOB!!!!! 

i feel like most of my life i have been told who to be or who not to be, what i can or cannot do. not because others were crude and wanted to control me, but because i let them. Well allow me to tell you who and what i am. i am a strong courageous young women who can overcome any obstacle put in my way. i am me. i am silly sometimes immature, caring, I worry too much and i love with all my heart. i am a daughter of god who can do anything!!!!

oh man that is a lot to learn in the first week of school. 

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wow what a couple of crazy stressful weeks it has been!!! i love my job!!!!! being an RA is a blast!!!! i couldn't ask for a better job with better coworkers. training was hard and grueling, move ins were crazy,but  this job is the best.
i love the priesthood!!!!!! life saving moments!!! so i was super stressed about RA, money, school, money, and money. two amazing young priesthood holders came over last night to give a scared stressed little girl some comfort.
i love roommates!! after the blessing i was telling my roommate a story of a princess a prince and a dragon, and all the potential trivial life threatening issues in my life. the sweet roommate reminded me of my blessing and that my heavenly father loves me and that he knows what he is doing, i just need to trust in him and give my life to him and he will take care of me.
 it's official!!!!! yesterday at church the bishopric passed around the annual pink paper asking for our records and information. the first box i noticed asked if i had been on a mission, of course i marked no. the next bo however is an entirely different more exciting story. the question? are you preparing for a mission? i excitedly marked yes. it's official i am preparing to serve a mission for the church of Jesus Christ of latter day saints!!!! i can't go for at least a year, but i am going!!!!!

my best friends mission

I hate mission. there i said it. Now let me take it back. i love missions and i think they are the most wonderful thing. i hate goodbyes. this summer i have attended my own ward a total of three times because of all the missionary farewells i have been to. at the begging it was so much fun watching my friends go out and serve, change lives along with their own. however the more farewells i went to the harder it got. so many of my friends were leaving. the last farewell was the hardest. this boy was amazing. he was already such a great missionary here in our little old town, he changed so many lives mine included. i went to his farewell heartbroken that it was the last time i would see him, but it wasn't. Monday four  of us went over to his house to say our last goodbyes. i watched him give an amazing blessing hugged him goodbye and walked away. none of us were all that good at goodbye's. we hugged we cried and we hugged some More until Finlay he had to walk into the house and i watched his empty porch as we drove away.
this is one of my many "my best friends wedding moments" (SPOILER ALERT) in this movie the main character wastes the whole movie away planning how to break up her best friends wedding stealing him for herself. the movie is filled with plots and schemes and Finlay at the end she watches her best friend walk away hand in hand with his new wife. i have lots of moments were i plan some earth shattering speech just to be the only audience member. this is what happened when i told my friend goodbye. it was nothing romantic but  wanted to let him know how amazing he was, how much he changed my life, that if anyone of us was going to save this world and bring the gospel of Christ to his people that it would be him. i wanted to say this and so much more, but all i could choke out was "see you into"
a week latter a friend of mine invited me to a missionary discussion. since i have been a member since birth i have never actually sat in on a real missionary discussion. i watched this young boy teach to these two individuals who already knew so much about the gospel, but had just struggled getting back into it. i have never felt the spirit so strongly before. it was a lesson i had learned every Sunday, a topic i had deemed as primary easy. it wasn't the young mans message i needed to hear but to feel his spirit. he strengthened my testimony on one small little concept i thought i grasped. however more than that he strengthed my testimony of missionary work. how selfish was i to be so heartbroken over so many of my friends leaving. they are going to change lives. i have a testimony of missionary work. i can't put into words how grateful i am for it, or as to how powerful i know it can be. what an amazing gospel we have been blessed with. these young men are completely selfless to give up two years of their life to share it with those who don't know about this amazing gift. i love missionary's and missions.